In This Moment(54)

Cole doesn’t answer me. With fire flashing in his green eyes, he stands up from his chair and reaches for my arm, dragging his hand along my skin from the elbow to the base of my palm. Instinctively, I grip his fingers and let him pull me past the mess of elegant tables and diners. We don’t pause at the hostess station or in the waiting area.

A warm rush of humid air breaks over my skin as Cole pushes through the main door of the restaurant. I follow—tripping over my feet, my out of control heart thudding loudly in my ears—as we move past a wall covered in a thick curtain of dark creeping jasmine, to a secluded nook. To one side of us, there’s a small koi pond the color of the coppery pennies that line the bottom of it. On the other, I make out a Mediterranean style archway that leads down to the boat docks. Breathing harshly through his nose, mouth set in a grim line, Cole pulls me to an abrupt stop just under the rise of the arch. He lifts his solid arms, effectively caging me between himself and the cool stucco pier at my back.

“What are you doing?” I ask delicately, a nervous energy swirling in the pit of my stomach.

The trickling light catches on the surface of his eyes as he leans in and brushes his lips just under my jawline. My eyelids fall involuntarily and the breath is expelled from my lungs all at once. Still gingerly exploring my throat with his mouth, Cole’s strong hands find my waist and he anchors his thumbs just below my navel, fanning his fingers out across the small of my back. I grip his forearms and push back, flattening my shoulders to the solid surface of the pier as I absorb the sensations ripping through my body. Slowly, like it hurts to push the sound off of his tongue, he whispers into the crook of my neck, “Aimee…”

Seconds tumble away from me. They slip from my fingers like rain on clean glass and I am falling with the drops—no definite direction. Cole squeezes my hips and crushes his body closer to mine so that I can feel the hard lines of him through the thin fabric of my dress.

“Cole,” I manage in between gasps. “What are we doing out here? My purse is still back at the table.”

“Fuck!” He moans ruefully, tearing himself away and pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes. “I can’t control myself around you.”

Not knowing how to respond, I drop my eyes to my silver sandals and spread my palms on the wall for balance.

“We’ll go back inside for your purse and we can get dessert or we can leave if you want to, but first I needed to get you out of there because…” his voice is gruff. “I couldn’t stand to not touch you. Please look at me, Aimee.”

Too overwhelmed, I shake my head and keep my eyes trained on my toes. “I can’t…”

“Please.” His hands return to my waist.

Neither one of us speaks or dares to breathe. I know without looking that beyond the archway, the moon is coming out—spilling its reflected light across the dusky sky, lingering on the silhouettes of palm trees and the outline of the single-story buildings across the street. I know that Cole is watching me, waiting with heady intensity for me to do something, anything. The wind changes direction, brushing the tiny hairs on my arms, fluttering the hem of my blue cotton dress around my legs.

I swallow and set my jaw. I think that I’m shaking a little. As soon as my eyes flick up to meet his, a current of energy buzzes from my breasts down to my thighs. Cole’s fingers knot together, digging into my back as he bends his head to kiss me. It’s a kiss so deep and hungry that it drenches me—soaking every pore of my body, weighing me down, making me go soft in the knees.

He doesn’t stop there. He separates my lips and traces the roof of my mouth with his warm, slick tongue and glides the tip across the back of my teeth. He tastes me like this—greedily sliding into me and drawing my body nearer—until my legs are tucked between his hips and I can’t tell which one of us is holding the other up.

I slip my hands inside the lapel of his jacket and run my fingers up over the taut muscles of his chest, feeling for his heartbeat through his shirt. When I find it, I flatten my palm over the spot as if I can hold the beats inside of him with just my hand. For a few tangled moments, I am nothing but heat and taste and smell and touch.

“I know,” he murmurs into my mouth like he’s responding to something I’ve said. Then he dips his lips to my bare arm and I have to squeeze my eyes shut and arc my back to keep myself from letting go of an embarrassing moan. Secluded or not, this is not the place to come apart.

Seeming to understand, Cole wrenches his mouth away from me. He cups my face between his firm fingers and finds my eyes with his. “I need to be honest about something,” he tells me, maintaining eye contact as he rests his forehead against mine and sweetly kisses the end of my nose. The pads of his thumbs stroke my cheek. “I like you too.”